Husker Du – Savage Young Du – album review

An authoritative collection of remastered tapes, demos and session masters, this is the beginning of Husker Du, who paved the way for the alternative music of today. Fighting Boredom have been immersing themselves in the noise, melody and emotion for just over a week now since we got hold of it. Read what we think below.

Right, I’m assuming, quite possibly wrongly, that if you are reading this you already know who Husker Du were. You already know of their brief bright flame burning blowtorch hot and bright in the eighties. Between 1983 and 1987 they released six albums, two of which were doubles. All peerless, seriously, you will already know this, they were the very best band in the world, to write a list of who they influenced or touched in their brief tenure would be a task too big for me to undertake. Grant Hart on drums, barefoot and hippy hair, Greg Norton on bass with the best moustache in Punk and Bob Mould on guitar, his playing savage, noisy and so melodic, Mould and Hart sharing the song writing and vocals. Then they were gone, a mess of suicide, heroin and control. I can’t emphasise enough what this band means to us at Fighting boredom.

The years since have been well documented, the drug use, lost record deals, resurgence of Bob Mould and the lack of visibility of both Grant Hart and Greg Norton. Bitter words in interviews, recriminations and belligerence. Then seemingly from nowhere the launching of a new website backed by all three members. People talked of a reunion but it was never going to happen and now it never will. Grant Hart passed in September this year, just as the three of them had brought this package into being, a bittersweet end to the story.

This is where they started. Savage Young Du is the perfect title, that’s exactly what this is. Husker Du rehearsals, live recordings and the first flurry of releases. It’s rough and hardcore, melodic and tarnished. The sound varies from good to bloody awful and that’s with the polishing too. But none of that matters, you turn it on and listen and you are hooked, the third or fourth time you listen you realise that the forty-seven, yes, forty bloody seven, unreleased tracks that could have been as good as what they gave us at the time you love them. The familiar songs,‘Everything Falls Apart’ and an alternate take on‘Land Speed Record’ are just blistering, massive slabs of sound but inside it you can see where they are going, the melodies are there, the tunes are a step on from too fast hardcore, they are moving even now towards that legacy of brilliance.

I’d say this was essential, unmissable and utterly mesmerising but you’d say I was biased. I’d say that this has just concreted for me that Husker Du really were the best band in the world but they’d have disagreed loudly, as Grant says at the end of one song‘We’re not the most professional band in the Twin Cities’ but it doesn’t matter. This is a collection of live tape recordings, demos and long-lost singles. It’s brilliant and you should buy it.